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Does he think? Does he read? I don’t know. But I seem to like the man’s sense of humor. He makes the G8 look like Mech “B”. Well, we did not have any women among us, but you get the drift!

Some of my friends (old and new) have conspired to bring me to a point where I have had to transcend to an avuncular state, leading to much introspection about life and the various mysteries it still holds. During one particular self analysis phase a couple of months ago, I realized that this phase, which is going to be forever btw, has the potential to rise at least a few embarrassing moments, unless I do something about it.

This phase came to its head sometime last week when the shiny silver motorola started buzzing with the advent of a text message that read “It’s a boy!!! Name (***insert random in-vogue sanskrit name***). 7.5 lbs”. Then I had an epiphany¹, or to internalize what Frank Maiers once said (via Answers.com), a spiritual flash that would change the way I viewed myself.

(more…)

One just spent part of a sunny (and mostly warm) weekend in the beaches around Dover (DE). A couple of bumper to bumper drives along NJTP book-ended the trip leading to considerable fatigue. But wholesome fun was had nevertheless, with a group of friends and acquaintances, some of whom were met for the first time and yet gelled with each other like Brylcream on Denis Compton’s hair. Legs were shaken and pulled. Tummies were filled to the brim with desi food and in some cases spirit as well. Photos were shot, which one will never post on here since posted pictures seem to take lives of their own, even a year after they were posted. But we cannot just resist this one since it seems to encapsulate the whole weekend.

Sometime during last week this blogger heard that news of this blog had been propagated to one and all in the family circles by the inspiration for what has come to be known as RCDM. So if you are one of those assorted family types who have landed here to see what Ravi is up to, please leave a comment. If such comments are seen, he will understand that stories of you having daily bed time accidents as a 5 year old (mostly imaginary and yet funny) or you falling into a compost/dung pit while trying to retrieve a cricket ball from that pile of “dirt” (true story) are to be avoided.

A couple of days ago, this happened.

And yesterday, this was the scene at a routine meeting.

And today we find where Asok is…

Scott, you rock dude.. you rock!

Disclaimer: Now that one knows how people react to a single guy’s pronouncements about women, in fact the barest mention of the word “gal”, one feels compelled to issue a disclaimer. Here it is - No Telugu speaking living being was harmed during the making of this blog post. Neither does this blogger have a hidden agenda nor it is the flavor of the season to poke fun on such people. However, being a single guy, one felt a need to drive away all the misconceptions that have been propogated and hence this post. We do hope that this post has some rhyme and if so, all kudos go to Art and Paul. So there. Stop seeing any hidden meanings behind the post. Oh wait, there was at least one and that was DEFINITELY not what you thought it was.

Once there was a Gulty gaal,
She used words like �whee� and all.
Ask, she did, about other gult chamiyas,
Answer, we did, without any guilt and bias.

Then it started, the pulling of limbs,
Scared away the occasional crumbs.
Our admirers came from near and far,
Thought �Oh dear, so near and yet so far�.

Our likeness was hunted for,
A single one was accounted for.
When pointed, it was, to every boy and gal,
Laughed at, it was, from here to hell.

Our celluloid taste tossed and sullied,
Like ellipsoidal shreds and then buried.
Our acknowledged industriousness,
was then mistaken for bull & nonsense.

Our music, our dance and fine language,
(Windy one time, windy two time)
was treated just like some smelly garbage.
(Windy one time, windy two time).

Soon start we did, to talk in rhyme,
Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme.
Set out we did, walking erect and tall
Try we did, to explain to one and all

Hear Hear, all ye hear,
Chamiya log from far and near.
Punjy, Bong, Tam, Mal and Gult,
But no single gal is yet exempt.

Call me up sometime,
Let�s meet up all the time,
Let�s look at the moon, and at the sun
Till that you�ve done, you�ll miss all the fun.

Lest you assume, we are not mad
Lest you decide, the chamiya�s not bad.
In the cloud, she surely sounds silly,
But ask the crowd, she really is funny.

…. the basic premise of this blog i.e., that I am no Superman, has not changed at all and as I mentioned then, you can still call me Superman-ian if you want to. What’s happened gradually these past few years is that this blog has become a part of my daily life, so much that my much lamented trait of forgetting birthdays has expanded to include this blog as well. Hence let me go ahead as usual and issue a note of belated (third) birthday greetings to this blog.

One more happening of note also went past unnoticed by me. This post is my 301st post. It was perhaps fitting that my 300th post was also the first one to be featured on Desipundit. This past year was eventful in a lot of respects, but I don’t think I am anywhere close to leaving my little cubbyhole in cyberspace.

Now, we turned three a couple of days ago. Apparently the time between the second and third birthday is called the terrible twos. I did not know that last year, but along those same lines, this coming year could be called the trashy threes. Now with 300 published posts, Blogger seems to hit some growing pangs. But that’s for another post for which some knowledgable minds would have to be consulted. So, at least till then, one shall continue churning out the trash that one so cleverly disguises as regular programming. All those of you who come here to get your fix of trash, do come back for more. And yah, for those of you who are wondering, that is *my* trash can.

Act I

Time: The afternoon of 18th of December, 2005
Location: An apartment in Jersey City
Key Protagonist: The hero
Background prop: Abhishek Bachchan grooving in that wannabe “Right here, Right now” video in some random desi cable channel playing on the 30″ Sony Vega
Scene: The hero watches the video with interest, and suddenly notices the gorgeous Pri’nka Chops and the funky rhythm from those hip hop fakers, Vishal and Shekhar.

*Cut*

Act II

Time: The next two weeks
(*1st note to cameraman: Do rapid cuts to show passage of time. This unit cannot afford an editor*)
Location: Everywhere - in a car, in the office, in the living room, in the kitchen, in the bedroom and in the shower
(* 2nd note to cameraman: Please focus on upper torso face only. This is a family picture and will not be available in MMS video format*)

Scene: The hero is listening to both versions of the “Right here Right now” number everyday on car stereo, lap top and on his desktop. One particular instance the song is played 6 times in a row before the hero figures out that that in the groovy hip hop version, Abi Jr. throws “heys” at “playah” Ritesh D, Big Pop (Big B???) Pri’nka Chops and Chuckmaster Sippy too. The hero is afflicted with a bad attack of ear worms in the process.

(*1st note to sound guy: Add jarring background noise at this point*)
(*2nd note to cameraman: Alternate the camera between focus and out of focus modes*)

*Cut*

Act III

Time: Late morning on the 3rd of January 2006
Location: The comments section of a well known blog
Scene: Still affected by the earworm, the hero leaves a Season’s Greeting in response to the aforementioned blogger’s New Year post.

Seasons Greetings….
*windy windy one time*
Have a wonderful year ahead!!
*windy windy two times*

*Cut*

Act IV
Time: Late night on the 4th of January 2006
Location: The comments section of the same blog

Scene 1: The blogger replies to the comment from our hero enquiring if his was a PJ and if so, could he please explain.

*Cut*

Scene 2: Hero replies thus:
[*Insert random blogger here, preferably played by someone capable of being the high priestess of templates and the kookiest character in the known blogosphere and beyond*]:

Right here right now,
hai kushi ka sama;
(Windy windy one time)
Right here right now,
ho gayi swarg jahaan,
(Windy windy two times)

*Cut*

Scene 3: Above mentioned blogger while “holding tummy and laughing away to glory” corrects our hero thus,

Right here right now
Hai khushi ka samaa
(Wind your body one time ..)
Right here right now
Hum hai is pal jahaan
(Wind your body two time ..)
Bhool jaao, muskuraao
Reh na jaaye baat baaki

*Cut*

Scene 4: Flashback to three years previously….. Hero sitting in front of a desktop (in his erstwhile role as a researcher in the intense field of production planning) doing his best imitation of Alka Yagnik (??) in a crowded research lab.

Mujhse mohabat ka ikrar karta,
kash koi ladka mujhe pyaar karta…
kash koi ladka mujhe pyaar karta;

(*Insert canned laughter as screen fades*)

(*Insert handwritten note that reads “The beginning….”)

*Shoot Wrap*

[Disclaimer: Names, characters, places, and incidents featured in/on this post are either the product of the blogger's imagination (well somewhat) or used fictitiously (somewhat again). Any resemblence to actual persons (living or dead), events, institutions, or locales, without satiric intent, is coincidental (God promise!).]

Jane Austen once wrote (and I have recycled this number of times) that It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife (or something to this effect). I don’t know if any of her descendents married into desi families, but one of them just might have, because most middle aged women with sons of marriageable age seem to share this sentiment to the last “T”. Particularly those Random Conservative Desi Moms (henceforth referred to, as RCDMs) who seem to inhabit the by lanes of Tam land down in the south of India.

The moment their offspring come in possession of a paycheck or two (the aforementioned fortune), their maternal instincts kick in and they plug their antennae into the neighborhood grapevine to look for a Ms. Right for the poor guy. Of course this being the digital age, the Sanskrit phrase Vasudaiva Kutumbakam seems particularly relevant and so this so-called neighborhood extends over the whole of the known world and beyond. By the time the poor guy gets first hand knowledge about the whole thing, there have already been a couple of enquiries in his name in his firm’s HR department. [1]

All this while, the guy who is in the dark regarding concerted efforts to get his “legs tied” (Tam translation being Kaal-kattu which is the colloquial Tam term for marriage), finds it strange that the whole of his city has been in involved in activities that involve the term “holy matrimony” in one way or the other. And he finds it strange that his mom seems to have met every friend of his who he hasn’t seen or talked to in a long time. What’s more, each of these friends seem to be on personal endeavors to rid themselves of their single status, or which is what they seem to talk to the mom about.

It is a well known fact that most RCDMs would be automatic shoo-ins for Republican party membership, with a large percentage of them being “anti pro-choice” advocates. Before you get me wrong, I mean they’d like their sons leave the choice of life partners to them, the moms and the dads. So it is not un-common to see them give their sons the standard talk on the virtues of arranged marriage. I got one myself the other day too and I was totally amused. It’s also funny that none of them would participate in any discussion about the “birds and bees” with their sons. The daughters seem to be well educated in these aspects, which is natural, I guess, but the boys get their education from the darkened movie halls in the bylanes where the movies played don’t match the posters pasted on the gates of the halls. Personally, an amusing incident was when, on the brink of my departure to the US, a grand-uncle of mine sent me off with the words - Thaniya pora. Thaniya thirumbi va (You are leaving alone. So you come back alone). Sadly, it looks like his words might be prophetic. Anyways I am digressing.

Then there are the soothsayers. To any Random Son of a Random Conservative Desi Mom (henceforth referred as RSRCDM), the talk of the stars and the signs coming from the mouth of his mom are as unclear as the Linda Goodman’s words that he had once memorized to impress (rather unsuccessfully, I should add) a few gals. And the really close amatuer star gazers (they do this for fun, it seems, which totally leaves them devoid of any accountability and so you can’t catch their collars for predicting that the future wife of the RSRCDM in question would be the heiress of the Hilton fortune), pitch in with a few bits of free advice and a few warnings too, resulting in awkward conversations like the one that I’ll detail now.

*RSRCDM is in the middle of a game of 8 ball with a few buddies. Sean Paul and Beyonce are crooning in the background as a few glasses of chilled coke (your mental image is brought you by Pixar and has been touched up by Industrial Light and Magic to remove the ubiquitous smoke and the 500ml bottle of Kingfisher from the frame) sit on a side table. As RSRCDM mentally exclaims “Quarter Ball, matter solved” and contemplates rolling the cue ball off the side wall to angle the 3 ball into the side pocket, his cell phone rings. RSRCDM abandons the shot and picks up the cell phone to find that it is RCDM.

RSRCDM: hello ma.
RCDM: Hey da. What are you doing?
RSRCDM: Playing pool with my friends, ma.
RCDM: Pool? What is that?
RSRCDM: oh, it is like billiards.
RCDM: Oh, so. Why are you playing, this late at night?

*RSRCDM decides that he has a long night ahead of him and hurriedly changes the conversation as he finds 3 other pairs of eyes boring into his face while his friends wait for him to play his shot.

RSRCDM: What are you doing ma?
RCDM: Nothing da. I just thought I will call you.
RSRCDM: Oh, ok.
RCDM: How are you? How was work this week?
RSRCDM: Work was fine ma. I am thankful that it is the long weekend.
RCDM: Oh ok. So what are you doing this weekend?
RSRCDM: I am going to look around for a car ma. I am spending a lot on rental cars. I am buying a used car.
RCDM: Good. What are you going to buy?

*RSRCDM gives RCDM a quick low down on the used car buying methodology. Seeing daggers in eyes of his buddies, he keeps the descriptions really short and tells her that he will be online in half hour once he gets back home. As soon as the game ends, RSRCDM heads back home and as expected his phone rings almost immediately after he walks in. And it is RCDM.

RCDM: Hello. Are you coming online?
RSRCDM: I don’t know ma. It�?s already too late. I think I want to go and sleep.
RCDM: oh ok. I won�?t keep you long. I just spoke to this astrologer last month and he had some advice for you.

*Instantly RSRCDM’s senses are all heightened and a light goes on inside his head.

RSRCDM: What did he say?
RCDM: Nothing da. I went to him because things seemed to be difficult for you career wise.
RSRCDM: Ohhhhh kkkk?
RCDM: He told me some things that have come true in the past two weeks or so. Now your career prospects are better right?
RSRCDM: Yeah?
RCDM: So then, he told me to pass on some advice to you.
RSRCDM: ok?
RCDM: You are a hardworking boy. And you are earning well.
RSRCDM: So?
RCDM: No. That means you are an eligible bachelor.

*RSRCDM now knows where this is going

RSRCDM: Ma, it�?s barely weeks since I started working, so stop!
RCDM: No. No. Just listen. He told me that boys like you are an attractive choice for Indian families in the US looking for a match for a daughter or two.

*RSRCDM decides that this is a conversation that is moving into unknown territory.

RSRCDM: WHAT?
RCDM: No, No.. The man told me that these families might want you to be their son-in-law and try to TRAP you into marrying their daughters.

*When RSRCDM’s friends wake up the next morning, they find him on the couch, sitting still, open jawed in shock. Last known, RSRCDM is still trying to recover from the shock of this new angle that seems to have stumped him, mute and defenseless.

So, it turns out that these days, every single desi guy needs to be wary about Entrapment. While the mention of the word conjures up images of Catherine Zeta Jones, a single look in the mirror reminds every RSRCDM that he is no Sean Connery and hence he resigns himself to the inevitable with a sigh and gets back to his life.

*Sigh*

All characters and incidents featured in/on this post are the product of this blogger’s imagination, well almost. Any resemblence to actual persons (living or dead) or events, is purely coincidental (well almost, again).

1. In fact there have been so many similar enquiries in IT firms that a few firms seem to have norms in place, governing responses to such enquiries.